‘Bring your phone. Call him from my place. I’m literally one minute away from here.’

The house was indeed virtually next door to Tabitha’s. It stood ‘kitty corner’ as the Americans would say, diagonally opposite and then about fifty yards along towards the centre of the village. Thea had passed it several times without taking any particular notice. A nice-enough stone building, detached, with a low hedge in front, it was just one of hundreds of similar Cotswolds homes. It had no close neighbours. Norma opened the front door without the use of a key, which prompted Thea to ask, ‘Is your husband at home?’

‘He’s not, actually. The fact is, he’s in Bulgaria at the moment – or is it Romania? One of those places. He’s a bit younger than me – still working up the career ladder, as they say. He’s doing well in the property business, and whatever’s going on politically, the Brits never get tired of buying somewhere cheap in the sun, even if the infrastructure’s impossible. He does try to warn them,’ she added defensively. ‘They always think it’ll be fine in their particular case. Sometimes it is, of course.’

‘Does he go to Poland?’ Thea asked, suddenly put in mind of Clovis and his innovative musicians. Clovis was still prodding and poking somewhere deep inside her skin.

‘A bit. It’s a much better country to live in than most of the others, but not so cheap any more.’

‘It’s nice that you leave the door unlocked,’ Thea said.

‘Oh, yes. Most people have got so paranoid about security, haven’t they? I’ve got nothing worth stealing, 320and you don’t get many burglaries these days anyway, do you?’

‘Don’t you?’

‘Oh no. The crimes are all done on computers now.’ Thea recollected that the woman had taught Ben how to work a spreadsheet – which implied she knew her way around a computer.

Thea was looking around the house. The hallway was lined with pictures in handsome old frames. There was a long narrow rug running the length of the hall floor that looked handmade. The stairs were carpeted in a rich crimson and the banisters were made of ornately turned wood that looked like oak. ‘I know – it’s like a museum,’ Norma said. ‘All old stuff from our parents. These are family photos, look.’ She indicated the pictures. One showed a large Edwardian wedding group, the bride and five bridesmaids all clothed in something white and highly attractive.

‘Pity they make the bridesmaids wear such hideous clothes these days,’ Thea remarked idly.

Norma did not reply directly. ‘Those girls are all sisters, cousins of the bride. It’s a lovely picture, don’t you think? And see that house behind them? It belonged to the bride’s mother, and then went out of the family. It’s a complicated story – just one of many, really.’

Thea’s spine began to tingle. There was something going on, a code or a hidden revelation. ‘Do you know who Gwendoline Wheelwright was?’ she asked.